Watch: Pearl Jam Wrap New Zealand Show with Crowded House’s Neil Finn
Photo Credit: Bahram Foroughi
After just over a month away from the road, Pearl Jam returned last week for the final leg of the expansive Dark Matter World Tour with a Nov. 8 performance at Auckland, New Zealand’s Mount Smart Stadium. This staging set off a seven-show series in New Zealand and Australia, which continued on Sunday, Nov. 10 with the band’s second and final show at Mount Smart Stadium. Before departing from New Zealand, Eddie Vedder and the 30-year grunge vanguard saluted their surroundings with an appearance from one of the nation’s most iconic musicians, welcoming Neil Finn for a sit-in to set off the encore.
Pearl Jam tore into its 17-track, single-set show with “Release,” the closer from its 1991 debut album Ten. The group remained fixed on its early catalog with the Ten intro “Once,” as well as “Low Light” and “Do the Evolution” from 1998’s Yield, before transitioning to its recent 12th studio album Dark Matter with “Scared of Fear,” “Wreckage” and “Waiting for Stevie.” Vedder led the band back into its greatest hits with a titanic treatment of the 1994 fan favorite “Better Man,” which teased things to come with a tag of Crowded House’s “Don’t Dream It’s Over.”
For the second half of the show’s main portion, Pearl Jam presented a more scattershot exploration of its massive canon, exemplified by cuts like “Dance of the Clairvoyants,” “Mind Your Manners” and “Amongst the Waves.” The quintet returned to Ten with standouts “Even Flow” and “Jeremy,” then dropped “Upper Hand” as the final Dark Matter entry of the evening. After 2009’s “Unthought Known,” the band solidified its focus on its studio debut by closing the set with “Black” and “Porch,” bringing on a total of six entries from that first collection in the set.
After a moment away, Pearl Jam returned to the stage for an encore in the company of Finn, who Vedder and the band have counted as an influence and collaborator for years. Together, the artists presented a high-energy cover of Australian art-rockers Hunters & Collectors’ 1984 hit “Throw Your Arms Around Me,” reprising a previous treatment from when Vedder sat in with Finn’s Crowded House during Ohana Fest. Finn’s appearance on Sunday followed a guest spot from his son, Liam, who contributed to “Habit” during Pearl Jam’s Nov. 8 staging.
Pearl Jam concluded its show with a sprint through six more unforgettable hits, issuing “Smile,” “Animal,” “Rearviewmirror” and “Alive” (the seventh Ten selection) before welcoming a young fan to the stage to play Eddie’s Stratocaster on Neil Young’s “Rockin’ in the Free World.” Finally, to send the Kiwi crowd off into the night, the band issued “Yellow Ledbetter.”
Pearl Jam’s five-night Australian run begins on Wednesday, Nov. 13 with a performance at the Gold Coast’s People First Stadium. For tickets and more information on the tour, visit pearljam.com/tour.
Watch Finn join the band for “Throw Your Arms Around Me” below and read on for the complete setlist from Sunday night.
Pearl Jam
Mount Smart Stadium – Auckland, New Zealand
11/10/24
Set: Release, Low Light, Once, Do the Evolution, Scared of Fear, Wreckage, Waiting for Stevie, Better Man, Dance of the Clairvoyants, Mind Your Manners, Even Flow, Amongst the Waves, Jeremy, Upper Hand, Unthought Known, Black, Porch
Encore: Throw Your Arms Around Me+, Smile, Animal, Rearviewmirror, Alive, Rockin’ in the Free World*, Yellow Ledbetter
Notes:
+ Hunters & Collectors cover w/ Neil Finn
* Neil Young cover w/ fan guitarist
Setlist via setlist.fm.
